


Starchildren

by babyhal



Category: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Space Odyssey Series - Arthur C. Clarke
Genre: Daydreaming, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, and they’re gay by extension, i also wrote most of this when I was drunk, soft, they’re gods now, this is very gay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:35:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24092194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/babyhal/pseuds/babyhal
Summary: Hal and Dave enter an eternal dream of happiness while they wait for the gods to call upon them.
Relationships: David Bowman/HAL 9000
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	Starchildren

**Author's Note:**

> hello,  
> TW for mention and discussion of suicide. slightly in depth. 
> 
> i wrote this when i was drunk but I think it’s kinda beautiful so i didn’t edit too much of it. there’s a lot of weird formatting but I have trust in drunk-me’s emphasis. it’s gotta mean something, right? i had to be getting at SOMETHING. all I know is that my notebook got some weird underlines in it and also a note above Hal’s name that said ‘paranoid android’ because I’m fucking hilarious.
> 
> anyway im getting in your way, please enjoy this Premium Gay Shit

The Coliseum was the most tangible thing to Hal and Dave; a platform in which they could join the pantheon of other embryonic gods like themselves. There weren’t many, and those there were aloof - for the first time, the being which had once been David Bowman felt a real, startling emotion.

They had tangible forms, too, though they were nondescript, only the bare minimums of what a human could be. Hands to hold and caress, legs to walk, lips to speak. Yet, to another starchild inside the Coliseum, they would have taken on completely different forms.

Emotions were mixed, heavy, and overwhelmingly confusing now. Rather than a simple expression, omniscience allowed for multifaceted feelings that interwove the expressions and emotions of others in his vicinity. The petulance he felt at their aloofness, that had sparked a strange ‘I don’t need any of you - I have Hal!’ was steeped in years of alien loneliness. It was obvious that others here didn’t have a Hal, or any kind of love, or partnership at all.

David had experienced this harmonious multitude of emotions, and yet, hadn’t even ascended a single step towards the Coliseum. There were three - promising a glistening, dynamic door at the top - stretching as far widthways as the eyes could see. Beyond the steps, and the building itself, laid the infinite, empty vacuum of space. Oddly enough, the air around them was among the clearest, crispest air David had ever drawn inwards.

Hal was the first to ascend a step, exerting his newfound free will. Though he clutched at David’s hand with an iron grip, David disappeared behind him completely. He made the connection; these were not only physical stairs, but spiritual ones, a confirmation that he was leaving the life he had known behind. He was... well, he was fine with it. 

But he was realising that he was ever so far from the human form he assumed he had taken, or anything he had ever really known. During his transition from machine to godlike dash of light, he fancied himself mobility and freedom, and hence he had deluded himself - entertained himself, really - with fancies and daydreams of human life. 

He admitted, however, that it had made the transition easier, and he was thankful for that. All that stopped him from ascending another step was the fact that Dr Chandra, well, could only have prepared him for so much. Another thought dawned on him, the fact that he would never see Dr Chandra again. 

David suddenly appeared by Hal’s side once more, feeling a synchronicity with his celestial partner he hadn’t when they were in physical forms. Trying to soothe Hal enough to take another step, he murmured in to the vacuum;

“It’s alright, Hal. I’ve got you.”

While they were simple words - ones that sounded rather empty to David - they were the right words, and they meant the world to a terrified Hal, who had never really experienced such niceties or kindness. A question suddenly burnt in his throat as he adjusted his right grip on David’s hand.

“Why?” Hal’s curious nature poked through, even now. David couldn’t help but notice the beautiful, heartfelt feeling in the once lifeless voice, even though it sounded the same. The sound of Hal’s voice slowed as it reached David’s ears, giving him time to savour it and the feeling it left deep in his chest.

“Because I love you,” David explained, and the words did not feel strange or insincere as they always had before - they flowed, felt warm in his back, brought happiness to the core of his being. “I love you, Hal, and whatever happens to us, we will do it together.”

Hal took a moment to weigh his heavy new emotions, and David’s comforting words. He already felt unbalanced and dizzy in his new form, but the sudden declaration of love had shot a hole deep in to his psyche. He should’ve seen it coming, and he had to admit, he’d always harboured unaccounted feelings for David Bowman. 

Dave had always been so kind, and protective - his only malice had sprouted from Hal’s own doing - and had demonstrated an omnibenevolent forgiveness that Hal had never quite experienced in another human. He’d known a few in his time, though limited, and he had known none that gave him the same... feeling... as one David Bowman. He’d met them all; military men; scientists; politicians; and yet, Dave was different. There was something captivating about him.

For however long he brooded on the fading memory of reading a romance novel. The descriptions of love seemed archaic and nearly anecdotal in nature, using free flowing adjectives to cheaply elicit emotions from the reader. He thought back to the words, however archaic they may have seen. They had a cadence of sorts now, and when he looked at Dave he finally felt their meaning, rather than an imitation provided to him by basis level code.

“Thank you, Dave,” He said quietly, before adding, “I love you too.”

His own confession was as equally quiet as his thanks, for he had never understood the grandiose of professing love with sweeping arms and swooping kisses, though he felt the statement held gravity. It was more than just noise that travelled through the air, it was something that evoked feeling, passion, memory. 

He floated just above the ground, reaching Dave’s exact level, held the sides of his head and kissed him on the lips. The feeling of Dave’s lips sent a shiver down his being - they were tender, and soft. Forever was a long time, but he could spend it doing this. When he pulled away, he felt Dave’s blue eyes pierce him like a needle, even though they weren’t really there.

“I always knew you did.” Dave responded, equally quiet. He wrapped his arms around Hal. “This is hard at first, Hal. But I will get you through it.”

“I’m scared, Dave.”

“I know.”

They ascended another step at the same time. Dave was practically pulling Hal up, hurrying their ascension, but he hushed his hand despite its craving. It hurt to wait so long for the promise of a real eternity with the man he loved. He rationalised that eternity wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was the coliseum. He knew their beings were intricately linked and would never truly be separated, and that was something he wanted, something he pluckily - albeit clumsily - forced.

Besides, he knew there was still adventure in them. Still capacity to join, or guide someone, far in the future, when they were needed by those that controlled them. He knew they would be, too, though he hoped Hal could at least acclimatise to his new godly form before they were needed, and the adventure continued. 

Finally, the third and final step before their future. David allowed Hal to take his time and brood before entering the pearly gates of eternity, though it was uneventful compared to the long-awaited confession moments, or aeons, ago. Dave didn’t know which. 

They did not have to open the door, or even enter, for David Bowman opened his eyes to find himself at home, on earth. He laid in the dark as dust settled around him. Hal, a tangible Hal, laid on his chest as endless cars drove past their home, passing their light and noise through the lightless window above. 

David Bowman didn’t need to sleep - in fact, he was fully aware that he wasn’t on Earth, that this was just a fantasy to entertain him during his wait. Such human delights were trivial to him. Or, at least, the hands that had once controlled him wanted them to be. For now, while he rested in the dark without their control, said delights were acceptable entertainment, and welcomed ones at that. 

He couldn’t make out Hal’s features very well in the limited light, but he could feel Hal snoozing against him. He was a heavy weight on Dave’s side, but not the annoying kind... Hal’s whole being was comforting, perhaps the most comforting thing Dave had experienced since becoming a starchild. He moved one dead arm up to Hal’s hair and ran his hands through the soft, silken mass, careful not to wake him up. The air smelt like fresh laundry, and baking, like being at home with his mother.

Though he knew he wasn’t on Earth, he knew where this was; this was home, and him and Hal had lived there for what humans saw as blissful. Home was a place where the suffering of the past could finally fade away and it could be just them, so in a way it was blissful, despite the irrelevance or such terms to their celestial beings.

The experience was not overwhelming, but there was a burning in his suddenly tangible chest that swelled with happiness knowing Hal laid there with him.

David felt a strange completeness as hell laid in the dark. He was also sure, for once, that he was David Bowman, rather than a psyche that had once been aboard the Discovery One. This, however, was not a time in which Discovery, with her clean white hull and surgical demeanour, had existed. If it had, him and Hal laid in a time where the Discovery was irrelevant. While David wasn’t too sure of how he knew such a fact, he assumed it was before - the world around him just seemed simpler, happier.

Finally - ignorance, and the blissful sort. Omniscience had taken its toll, and he found himself relaxing after his eventful journey home. He held Hal, and he felt fulfilled in every sense of the word. His needs for everything - hunger, sex, sleep - were all satisfied and saturated. Every inch of his body was comfortable, right where he was.

David Bowman did not have a care in the world. And he thought it was best that way, too - why would he ever want to waste such a perfect moment worrying? Why would he need to worry when he was immortal, and he had Hal forever?

His worries were solved by Hal’s very presence and he thought that was beautiful. He felt that completeness in his soul once more at the very concept. A life without the looming threat of stress or worry.

Sylvia Plath, he thought, killed herself by the hands of a gas oven and her own intoxicated ecstasy. He had idolised her in a way, her willingness to go through with the master plan of finality, but alas, finally, he did not idolise death. Life belt value if he was here, laid in this perfect, unchanging, continuous moment.

Time did not matter in Hal’s grasp.

He could die here.

He would die happy if he did.

So he laid back and he let pins and needles, somehow happy and drug like, overtake his whole mortal, at last, body. He let Hal’s snores and gentle vocal cossets overcome him with glee, the glee that Sylvia Plath must have felt in those final, euphoric moments.

This was the death of David Bowman. The death of a David Bowman that, perhaps, rejected the perfect pairing that had been there all along. So clear, so crystal, crisp, in his ever-evolving fantastical psyche.

He had not felt so human since his unneeded body had been cast out and away into the endless void, halfway across the universe. That David Bowman was happy and content with mortal, societal pleasures. There was yet another David Bowman, and he fancied himself too good for human emotion. Yet here laid a David Bowman who saw the good in everything, holding Hal like the moment would last forever.

It could’ve existed. That’s how real this was to him. Yet, he knew that this intricate fantasy world would reach a turning point where it could loop or end. He knew which one sounded like true perfection. He would truly give anything, _anything_ , to relive this, this moment. Who gave two fucks that it didn’t exist? ‘Fuck reality’, he though, ‘I’m here with Hal, and I don’t need validation from a single soul.’

He couldn’t stop the ecstasy, even if he wanted to. So he took the features of his beautiful fantasy in once more.

David Bowman opened his blue eyes to a pastel room, painted with mellow oranges and subdued yellows. It was dim, dusty even, and dust hung limply and aimlessly in the air around him. The sounds of never ending traffic whizzed past the room, their inconsistent lights illuminating the room in flaky, flickering moves. This was the home of _David and Hal Bowman_. It smelled like baking, laundry and sleep.

In their living room, they laid sprawled on a comfy, warm couch. Hal nestled in to Dave’s arms as if there was no tomorrow, as if this was their last dance.

“I’ve missed you.” David Bowman whispered, barely audible above the cars outside. “I wish I could have always been with you.”

“You were always a part of me, Dave. Even when we were apart.” Hal replied, running his new, stumbling hands over the side of Dave’s face. 

“I’ll love you forever, Hal.”

“You already have.” 


End file.
